Storms wallop Illinois, leaving one dead, several injured

A mid-afternoon run of severe summer storms with high winds and downpours took state residents by surprise, injuring dozens and killing one.

Throughout the Chicago area many scurried to shelters as tornado sirens blared. The county’s most severe reports of damage came from West Chicago, where a roof collapsed over a one-story building in the 300 block of Fenton Lane, an industrial sector of town.

Forty people were injured, seven of whom were taken to Central DuPage Hospital, said Cmdr. Mike Uplegger of the West Chicago Police Department.

A resident in the central region around Galesburg was killed when a tree fell on him, and others were injured by flying glass and debris as the storm passed through. Officials had a number of reports of people trapped in their homes.

In the northwest region, August officially became Rockford’s wettest month on record when 0.57 inches of rain fell in an hour. That gave the city a total of 13.82 inches since Aug. 1, erasing the old total of 13.55 inches, set in August 1987. The city is still trying to recover from flooding that occurred earlier this month.

Winds across parts of the state reached up to 100 mph. Kirk Huettl, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Lincoln, said no tornadoes were spotted in the Galesburg area, but the straight-line winds were the same intensity as an F1 tornado.

Reports were unconfirmed of a tornado touchdown in the western suburbs of Chicago.

Huettl said the wind damage was the worst the National Weather Service has seen in the central Illinois region this year.

The storms raging through the area left 186,000 customers without power as of 4 p.m., said ComEd spokesman Luiz Diaz-Perez. ComEd services Cook, DuPage and Kane counties.

As of 4 p.m., about 108,000 customers lost service north of Chicago, 36,000 in the south suburbs, 30,000 in the city and 12,000 in the western portion of the service area.

In the central region, 11,000 were without power at 4 p.m. in Galesburg, and 4,400 were without power in Monmouth, according to Ameren’s Web site.